A military veteran and security expert leads a team who are protecting scientists investigating a planet for possible human colonization. He's captured by one of the supposedly unintelligent inhabitants, yet it somehow speaks his language. Then he has the opportunity to learn more about his captor in an unexpectedly exciting manner. A story of acceptance and love on an "uninhabited" planet.A peek inside:"Maybe it is unlikely, but the reality of the situation is that we don't know because we haven't been here long enough to study either the local solar system or the planet. In contrast, The People have been here a lot longer than we have and since they captured our vessel in orbit, they obviously have technology which is probably as good as or better than ours. They're the experts on this planet and we should be willing to listen to them rather than make half informed guesses. Wouldn't we want to be considered the experts of our own home worlds and be consulted if other beings came to visit?""I'm beginning to wonder if you've been influenced by your 'friendship' with one of them."Mal shakes his head as he answers, "No. I had those thoughts long before I met Sunshine. Over the course of my training and career, I've been to quite a few planets and never before have I seen a world like this one. It reminds me of recordings I've seen of our ancestral world before humans overpopulated it and fought over it and turned it into a wasteland. And every one of the other planets where humans have settled and can live on the open surface is in the process of becoming just like our ancestral planet. Some are moving in that direction faster than others, but compared to what the planets were like when humans first 'discovered' them, they're all on the road to becoming wastelands.""But we need more room to live.""No, we need to be more responsible with what we have rather than steal from others. How many actual or possible anthro-equivalent beings have we, as humans, destroyed in our greed to take possession of what they had? I'm glad I'm not a religious person or I would be afraid to face the judgment of my deity."Doctor Adams and a few of the others blanch at that thought since they claim to be deeply devout believers who are taught to share their faith with any beings who are anthro-equivalent. He partially recovers and asks, "Whose side are you on?"Mal slightly grins then says, "To quote one of my childhood comic book heroes, 'The side of truth and justice'. If I don't want somebody to break into my home and vandalize it then I have to treat other people with the same respect and not break into their home and vandalize it. Aren't we taught as children to live by the rule of respect? 'Do to others as you would have them do to you.'.""That's called the 'golden rule'.""Not where I came from. The 'golden rule' is 'he who has the most gold, rules' and that's been the situation throughout history and is alive and well today. In fact, it's the very reason we're here. Somebody with money decided they wanted to exploit the resources of a virgin world in order to make even more money and here we are.""We're here to find a suitable home for our fellow humans.""That's the propaganda of the government and the businesses which funded and own this expedition. What happens when we find a suitable planet for humans? The owners will transport people out here, for a big price of course, then they'll ship back the natural resources of the planet to make even more money. It's all about the acquisition of more possessions as represented by how big their bank accounts are.""If you've been so cynical about the purpose of our expedition, why did you come?""To be blunt, I needed a job just like the rest of you and this type of work is what I do best. My second reason is that I have also been looking for a new home for ... It has been said that the best things in life are free and so are this writer's stories. Hope you enjoy them.
